Scale the Mountain
by Link and Luigi
Summary: There are three flags located on the top on the mountain. Each team only needs to bring one back to their teachers. Whichever three teams bring a flag to them will be declared the winners. The team that doesn’t bring a flag back loses.


Scale the Mountain

All the jounins had gathered their students up, a total of twelve, in a random clearing the woods. They were all puzzled as to why they were there because they had not been enlightened as to what was happening.

"Good morning students!" greeted Asuma as he and the other three jounins walked into the clearing.

"We have a very important mission that we need you all to go on!" announced Kurenai.

"All you have to do is climb that mountain over there!" said Gai, pointing to a mountain off in the distance.

The students looked at the jounins. "Is that all?" said Kiba sarcastically.

"That's troublesome." Said Shikamaru.

"Yes but there's a twist!" said Kakashi.

"There's always a twist." Said Naruto with a sigh.

"There are three flags located on the top on the mountain." Kakashi said. "Your team only needs to bring one back to us. Whichever three teams bring a flag to us will be declared the winners in the order in which they brought them back. The team that doesn't bring a flag back loses."

"Wait, I thought you said this was a mission." Said Neji. "This sounds like a competition to me."

"Yeah, Kurenai was lying." Said Gai.

Kurenai shrugged. "Sorry, it just popped out of my mouth." Said Kurenai.

"So should we start now?" asked Lee.

"No because you don't know what your teams are!" said Gai as if Lee was being silly for assuming that the teams would be as they have been all his life.

"New teams?" groaned Ino. "This is all you, isn't it, Asuma?"

"No!" said Asuma. "Don't be ridiculous! It was Kakashi's idea!"

"Yes, it was my idea." Said Kakashi, playing along.

"It was MY idea." Said Asuma, looking offended that Kakashi would take the idea away from him. Kakashi rolled his eyes, although you could only see one of them being rolled unless he lifted up his little forehead protector. But we can all assume that he was rolling both his eyes since it is REALLY hard to roll only one eye. Go on, try it. Hard, isn't it?

But then again, he's Kakashi so I wouldn't be surprised if he COULD.

"So have you previously and cleverly assigned us teams that make sense according to our skills?" questioned Sasuke.

"Um…" said Kurenai. "Remember your numbers."

She counted to four three times while pointing to each student individually. "All right, all the ones go over and stand by Gai. All the twos by Kakashi, all the three's by Asuma and all the fours by me!"

Lee, Shino and Shikamaru all went by Gai.

Sasuke, Chouji, Hinata, Sakura and Ino went by Kakashi.

Neji, somewhat confused and all alone, went by Asuma.

The remaining Kiba, Naruto and Tenten stood next to Kurenai.

"Am I in the wrong group or something?" Neji asked. "Was there only supposed to be three groups?"

"No." said Kakashi, looking at the five people standing in front of him. "Ino and Sakura are being adolescent girls and pretending like we wouldn't notice if two of them went to the wrong group just be with Sasuke."

Sasuke glared at Ino and Sakura with the, "Geez, you're so annoying," expression that immediately got them to run back over to where Asuma and Neji were standing.

"That's better!" said Gai. "But before you all run off to complete this competition, we have a few guidelines."

"FIRST!" said Kurenai. "Every member of the team must be there when collecting the flag! That means that a faster member of the team can't just sprint up the mountain and return to the bottom where the rest are waiting! Everyone must scale it TOGETHER!"

"And, this one's a little complicated so bear with me." Kakashi continued. "You cannot use any special abilities or jutsus until suggested to you by other teammates. Meaning that if Shino wanted to use his bugs to do something, he wouldn't be able to use them unless Lee or Shikamaru tell him to do so. He is not allowed to say, 'How about I use my bugs?' or even mention it. It must be suggested by the teammates."

"That's really lame." Said Sakura.

"SILENCE!" yelled the jounins.

"As a final note," Asuma said. "We'll know if you cheat. We'll be watching you when you least expect it. And if you cheat, you automatically lose and no one wants that to happen!"

"You all start and we're going to go on various points on the mountain and watch you!" said Gai. "All right, go on. Go on. Go. Get the flag." The four of them disappeared.

The students were, at first, a little…immobile.

"Come on!" said Kiba as he got over his shock and hit Naruto on the arm. "Let's go get the flag!"

"YEAH!" agreed Naruto as he and Kiba sprinted off. Tenten stood there for a moment and then quickly followed after them.

"HEY!" bellowed Lee, turning to Shino and Shikamaru. "THEY'RE GOING TO BEAT US TO THE FLAG! WE HAVE TO BEAT THEM!"

"There are three flags." Sighed Shikamaru.

"We might as well." Said Shino with a shrug as the three of them ran off.

"You two better not slow me down." Said Sasuke, pointing at Chouji and Hinata as the three of them started up.

"Um…I'll try not to!" said Hinata nervously.

Chouji didn't say anything. He was SO SAD because he wasn't with Shikamaru anymore and now he was stuck with Sasuke who was just a jerk! A psychotic jerk with a superiority complex, at that.

Neji looked at Sakura and Ino who were scoffing at each other.

"Wouldn't it be great if one of us could see things really well?" said Neji, knowing he wasn't allowed to use his Byakugan on his own without it being suggested by Ino or Sakura. "I mean, if someone just could see the flags really easily and find the best route to them?"

"Yeah, that would be great." Sighed Ino. "I bet if I was with Sasuke, he'd be able to find the best route to the flag!"

"There IS a certain clan that would be able to." Said Neji. "You know, an advanced bloodline that has the ability to see things really well? It affects the eyes…"

Sakura and Ino looked at each other.

"I thought the Sharingan could only copy moves." Said Sakura.

"No, it can read things too." Said Ino. "And it can tell which is the real thing in a group of bunshins!"

"No no, not the Sharingan." Neji said, shaking his head.

"You mean the Chidori?" asked Sakura.

"That's such an awesome move." Said Ino.

"Yeah but it wouldn't be helpful in finding a route to the flags." Neji said. "On the other hand something else might be."

"How about that fire move that he always does?" Sakura tried.

"That move never works!" Ino said immediately.

"That's right…" said Sakura. "And I don't know if it would really help us find a way to the flag…"

"But Sasuke's not even in our group so it wouldn't really matter!" said Ino sadly.

"Oh geez." Said Neji, slapping his forehead. "We might as well start and maybe it'll hit you guys on the way."

Meanwhile!

"I think we're far enough ahead to stop and brainstorm!" said Naruto, looking in the direction where they had come from. The three of them stopped.

"Does anyone have any ideas on how to get the flags?" Tenten asked.

"Well I have an idea but I'm not allowed to say it." said Kiba.

"So it involves you…" said Naruto, scratching his chin. He and Tenten then stared at Kiba for a little while as he stood there awkwardly, holding Akamaru and not really doing anything else.

"Oh!" said Tenten. "Your sense of smell?"

"Right!" said Kiba.

"Yeah!" said Naruto. "Obviously, our four teachers were on this mountain so you could just follow their trails and wherever they end, the flags will be there!"

"That's right!" Kiba agreed as he put Akamaru on the ground and the two of them started sniffing around while Tenten and Naruto cheered them on. "This way!" he yelled, pointing forward as the FOUR of them ran off and followed where Kiba was pointing.

Meanwhile!

"Come on guys!" said Lee as he ran ahead of the sauntering Shino and Shikamaru. "You're going really slow! We have to go faster! YEAH!" With that, he wound up a punched a tree so hard that it got uprooted and sent into orbit.

"That's the fourth tree you've punched into orbit." Said Shikamaru, watching the tree sail away.

"That's because you guys are being really slow!" said Lee as he jumped up and down.

"I could go faster but there's no point if Shikamaru's not going to." Shino said.

"I'm soaking in my surroundings." Said Shikamaru. "It's what I do. I have to in order to know how to get to the top. There's no sense in the way you're leading, just randomly running around and punching things."

"Well then what would you suggest?" Lee demanded as he stomped over.

Shikamaru sighed, looked around and then spotted a little plant that was snapped in half. "There's a snapped plant here." He observed.

"That could mean anything!" said Lee. "Shino could have stepped on it! I could have just stepped on it! YOU could have just stepped on it!"

"I was just saying that in front of this branch, there's an irregular assortment of leaves." Shikamaru continued. "As you can see, all the leaves in this area are disturbed while the leaves over here have all fallen in a natural way. If you look, you can tell that people have passed by this area recently which can only mean one thing."

"OUR TEACHERS WERE GOING THIS WAY TO SET UP THE FLAGS!" Lee filled in the blanks.

"Right." Shikamaru said.

"LET'S GO!" yelled Lee as he started running in the direction of the 'disturbed leaves'.

Shikamaru had actually made up that part with the leaves being disturbed. He was just following the footprints that were to the left of him and figured he'd just make himself look even smarter than he already was in the process of doing so.

Meanwhile!

"All right, since we have to rest here ANYWAY, we might as well make good use of our time." Said Sasuke, glaring at Chouji who was taking out a bag of chips from his backpack. "What do you two do ability-wise?"

"Aren't we not allowed to say?" Hinata asked.

"Oh right." Said Sasuke. "Then I'm going to try to guess. And you say yes or no, or…close or something."

"Hot or cold?" suggested Chouji.

"You don't know what I do?" Hinata said.

"No clue." Sasuke replied truthfully.

"Well, I do mostly the same things as Neji." Hinata explained.

"I haven't seen Neji fight either." Sasuke confessed.

"Oh." Said Hinata. "Okay then. I'll tell you hot or cold then…"

"All right…I'm thinking…healing powers?" Sasuke tried.

"Um…cold…" Hinata said.

"Well, I've seen Hinata fight before." Chouji said.

Sasuke turned around and stared at Chouji with a very irritated face. "And you didn't say that earlier because…?" he lead.

Chouji shrugged in response.

"So what can she do?" said Sasuke.

"The Byakugan, right Hinata?" said Chouji, and Hinata nodded. "It's like… x-ray vision and binoculars all in one!"

"Stop there." Said Sasuke. "That's perfect. Here I was thinking I got the worst group out of everyone. Hinata, just use your Byakugan to find the flag."

"Worst group?" said Chouji with a raised eyebrow.

"Okay, I guess." Said Hinata, feeling somewhat offended as she stood up.

Meanwhile!

"I think we're in last place…" complained Sakura, looking up and shielding her eyes from the sun. "We are not moving up this mountain very strategically at all!"

"Think about it…" Neji said, getting in front of her. "There is someone who could use their advanced bloodline abilities to help us find the flags."

"Sasuke wouldn't help us because he's in a different group!" Ino reminded him.

Neji barely kept himself from smiting them both. "No," he said instead. "I'm talking about ME."

"Oh." Said Sakura and Ino.

"Well?" Neji asked after a moment's pause.

"Well what?" Sakura said. "You don't have the Sharingan."

"Very true." Neji said. "Instead of the Sharingan, I have the…" He gestured for Sakura or Ino to fill in the blank.

"Um…" Ino and Sakura said slowly.

"The…Byakugan?" Ino finished hesitantly.

"And during this race, I can't use the Byakugan unless you two suggest that I should." Neji said, finally happy that they were getting somewhere.

"Why, do you want to?" asked Sakura.

"Yes…yes, I do." Neji replied. "Because, with the Byakugan, I could find…"

"Um…er…Sasuke!" Sakura said immediately.

"NO!" yelled Neji as Sakura and Ino jumped back and cowered in fear. "I mean…no…what ELSE could we find?"

"The flag!" Ino said.

"Right, so all you two have to do is…"

"Tell you to use your Byakugan!" Sakura cheered.

There was a pause.

"…So?" Neji led.

"Use you Byakugan to find Sasuke!" said Ino. "Or…um…the flag!"

"Finally." Neji sighed.

Meanwhile!

Naruto, Tenten and Kiba were making very good time with their technique of following the scents of the teachers. "Wait, wait!" said Kiba, stopping suddenly. "There's a fork!"

"I don't see a fork." Said Tenten. They were currently standing on a broad plateau-ish area.

"No, you can't SEE it." said Kiba. "Earlier, I was following the scents of both Kakashi and Gai. They were walking together. But now, Kakashi went this way, and Gai went that way."

"We should follow Gai." Said Tenten.

"Yeah right!" said Naruto. "We should follow Kakashi!"

After a quick game of Rock, Paper, Scissors, they came to the conclusion that they would be following Gai. "Come on, let's go!" said Kiba excitedly as he started running in the direction that Gai went. "It's right over here! I know it!"

"Wait for us!" called Naruto as he and Tenten ran after Kiba.

Kiba was now relying on his nose, not his eyes. So that's why he leapt right off the edge of a cliff without even realizing it.

"DO SOMETHING!" Tenten and Naruto yelled at each other. "OKAY!" They both reached into their little pockets and tossed shuriken at Kiba in attempt to catch him on the side of the cliff that was opposite to them by his clothes. It was successful and Kiba didn't die.

Kiba reached down and caught Akamaru before he tumbled to his doom. "Thanks guys!" said Kiba. "Guess I wasn't paying attention."

"Look next time!" said Naruto.

Kiba wasn't really listening to Naruto, more to Akamaru who was barking. "Leave my mom out of this!" He said finally. "No, Akamaru, no. YOUR mom. What? The flag?"

Kiba looked up to see a little blue flag hanging above him. "Guys! Look! It's the flag!" he yelled.

"GET IT!" Naruto and Tenten yelled back.

Kiba reached up in attempt to get the flag but it was just a little bit too high for him. So he stretched and tried his hardest and was about to grab it when another hand suddenly came out of nowhere and swiped it before he could. Upon looking even further up, Kiba noted Sasuke standing there with all the chakra concentrated to his feet so he was standing on the side of the cliff. In his hand, he was holding the flag.

"HEY!" Kiba said. "I got that first!"

"That's funny, because it's in MY hand." Said Sasuke.

"Um…he was about to get it, maybe we should give it to him." Said Hinata as she looked over the edge of the cliff.

"No." said Sasuke as he walked back up the side.

"THAT'S NOT FAIR!" yelled Naruto, shaking his fist at Sasuke. "THAT'S OURS! GIVE IT BACK!"

"I'm sorry Kiba!" said Hinata as Chouji and Sasuke started walking away. "It's not like we took the flag from you just because you couldn't get it, we just took it because that was the flag we were going after anyway! So it's nothing personal, really!"

"Hinata, come on!" said Chouji. "We have to go back to the teachers!"

"Good luck, Kiba!" said Hinata as she hurried after Chouji and Sasuke.

"What's the fastest way down the mountain?" Sasuke pondered.

"We could just go back the way we came." Chouji suggested.

"But that wasn't a very fast route." Sasuke said.

"We were the first ones to get the flag so maybe it was." Hinata pointed out.

"We're the first ones?" Chouji asked.

"Yes." Hinata answered. "The other two flags are just sitting in the same spot so that means that no one else has gotten them."

"What if we got all the flags?" Sasuke said. "That way, no one else would even finish this competition."

"Is that very fair?" Hinata said slowly.

"They never said to just get one flag." Sasuke pointed out.

"I think we should just go down and give our flag to the teachers." Said Chouji. "I don't feel like being up here anymore."

"Um…yeah!" said Hinata because she actually just didn't want to take another flag from Naruto and Kiba.

"Whatever, let's just get to the bottom." Said Sasuke.

Meanwhile!

"So where are the flags?" said Ino since she and Sakura had been following Neji for a little while and were starting to get bored.

"Right around here." Neji said as they entered an area with trees and vegetation. In a net hanging from a tree were Tenten, Kiba and Naruto.

"I knew Kakashi's would have a trap!" said Naruto.

"You should have said something then!" said Tenten.

"They have the flag." Neji said to his team.

"Are we allowed to steal it from other teams?" Sakura asked as they approached the three in the trap.

"We can't have our flag stolen from us TWICE!" complained Kiba. Neji reached up and pulled the flag down that was hanging from the tree right near where the trap was.

"All right, let's go." he said, turning to his team.

"Does anyone have a shuriken or something?" Naruto said to Kiba and Tenten.

"I used my last one to pin Kiba against the side of the cliff." Tenten said.

"I have one." Said Kiba, pulling one out of his pocket.

"Use it!" commanded Naruto as Kiba. Kiba immediately started sawing away at the ropes as Akamaru chewed at them. Within seconds, the trap collapsed and they were all free.

"Let's get that flag back!" announced Kiba, pointing at Neji, Sakura and Ino who were all walking away.

"How about you run after them?" suggested Tenten to Kiba.

"How about you do it?" Kiba suggested to Naruto.

"And you?" Naruto said to Tenten.

"OKAY!" they all cheered as they ran after the other team.

The Neji, Ino and Sakura team turned around to see that the Naruto, Tenten and Kiba team was now chasing after them. So they decided to start running.

It was quite easy for the NTK team to topple Ino and Sakura, leaving them in the dust. Now all that was left was for them to get Neji. Neji knew that he couldn't present the flag to the teachers without Sakura and Ino there, so he stopped running, turned around and decided he'd fight it out! Even though it was three against one, it's what HAD to be done!

"Ha, it's four against one!" laughed Kiba, petting Akamaru who as residing in his jacket.

"That's not enough to beat Neji!" Tenten said. "Naruto, use your Kage Bunshin to make it more!"

"Right!" said Naruto. "It's a good thing you said that because I was just about to do it without you suggesting it! Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

With that, Naruto multiplied by… A LOT.

Neji was a bit surprised at first. He could handle three against one, but six billion against one?

Meanwhile!

"And here it is." Shikamaru said, picking up a flag that was attached to a tree with a shuriken. "Told you guys I knew what I was doing."

"It's a good thing Lee didn't randomly decide to punch THAT tree into orbit." Shino said.

"ALL RIGHT!" cheered Lee. "I BET WE'RE IN FIRST PLACE! LET'S HURRY BACK TO THE TEACHERS!"

"We don't have to hurry." Sighed Shikamaru. "We have a flag, no one's going to beat us. We're automatically in the top three."

"Yeah but I want to get down there FIRST!" Lee whined, throwing a temper tantrum.

"No…" Shikamaru said in a whiny tone.

"Well I'M the oldest so I get to make the decisions!" Lee announced.

"In case you haven't noticed, I'm a chuunin." Shikamaru pointed out.

"AW MAN!" Lee yelled. "What if I carried you!"

"Hm…I guess…" Shikamaru said.

"YEAH!" said Lee. "I'll carry you BOTH!"

"No, that's all right." Said Shino. "I can move on my own just fine."

"SO LET'S GO!" Lee yelled.

Meanwhile!

"Which team do you think will be down here first?" asked Kakashi to the rest of his friends as they sat around the table in that restaurant. You know which restaurant we mean.

"I think Shikamaru's group because Shikamaru is a chuunin!" said Asuma.

"AND they have Lee in their group!" said Gai as his teeth went PING!

"There's really no telling." Said Kurenai. "Each team as their own handicap."

Just then, Sasuke, Chouji and Hinata entered the restaurant. "We got the flag." Sasuke said, slamming the flag down on the table. "I thought you guys said you'd be stationed around the mountain making sure we didn't cheat."

"Um…we are!" said Kakashi. "We're just…uh…bunshins! Look underneath the underneath!"

"Right." Said Sasuke, rolling his eyes.

"So your team wins!" said Kurenai, picking up the flag. "This is a valid flag! This is the one YOU put down, right Gai?"

"Yeah!" said Gai. "I put that one on the side of a cliff! Did you guys have fun getting that one?"

The three only stared blankly at Gai.

"So now we have to wait for everyone else." Said Asuma.

Kakashi cleared his throat a few times. "Gai, I noticed that the one team that didn't have any of YOUR students won…" he commented.

"The next team will DEFINITELY have a member of my team on it." Gai said, crossing his arms and pouting.

"Well duh." Said Kurenai.

Meanwhile!

"Did you see where they went?" Ino said to Sakura as they looked around for everyone else.

"The battle kind of went in this direction…I think…" Sakura replied as the two rounded a little grove of trees to see a humorous sight. It was Neji in a net hanging from a tree, in the midst of cutting himself out with a shuriken.

"What are you doing?" Ino asked just as he cut it and then landed gracefully on his feet.

"I should ask you the same question." Neji said.

"How did you get caught in a trap?" Sakura said. "I thought you were supposed to be able to see that kind of stuff."

"It's kind of hard to concentrate on things when there are seven thousand Narutos charging you all at once." Neji said, looking perturbed. "Where were you two when I needed to be backed up?"

"Um…" said Ino and Sakura hesitantly as they pointed vaguely in many directions.

"Never mind." He sighed. "We can still catch up with them and get the flag back if we hurry."

"Let's just go after the OTHER flag!" said Sakura.

"No, the other team already has it and they're practically back at the teachers." Said Neji, trying to urge the other two along.

"How about we just call it a day?" Ino said with a shrug.

Neji looked like he was at a loss for words. "Let's at least TRY." He said.

Meanwhile!

"WE HAVE A FLAG!" Lee was screaming at the top of his lungs as he ran to the restaurant with the grill in the middle of the table and practically barreled down the door. He dropped Shikamaru and the two of them stood there for a moment in front of the teachers.

"…Where's Shino?" Kurenai said, crossing her arms.

Shikamaru and Lee looked out the door nervously. That's when Shino came jogging in the door. "RIGHT HERE!" Lee announced.

"You can't expect me to be able to keep up with you." Said Shino to Lee. "No one can keep up with you."

"I can." Said Sasuke.

"Look at our flag!" Lee yelled, ignoring everyone else.

He presented the flag to the teachers and they looked at it.

"Well, this looks like the right flag!" said Asuma. "I think this is the one _I _put down! Naturally Shikamaru would be the one to find it because he's a CHUUNIN!"

"It was easy." Shikamaru said.

"Because you're a chuunin, right?" Asuma asked.

"Um…right." Shikamaru replied.

Just then, Kiba, Naruto and Tenten came sprinting in and nearly collapsed from exhaustion. "WE GOT ONE!" said Naruto, holding their flag triumphantly up in the air.

"And THIS one was almost stolen from us too!" said Tenten, glaring at Sasuke.

"Oh happy day!" said Kurenai. "No one on my team failed!"

"You know, this isn't supposed to be about whose team is better." Asuma said. "We're supposed to be helping them gain teamwork skills."

"Don't even talk, you were joining in on it too." Kakashi said.

"Well so were you." Asuma replied.

"I'm not denying it." Kakashi said with a shrug.

Then they had to wait a good forty-five minutes for the NIS team to finally make it to the restaurant. Neji didn't look too happy, but can you blame him? Ino and Sakura were happy because they were with Sasuke again and they couldn't really care less if they won the competition or not!

"Okay…so what was the point of that?" said Sasuke when all was said and done.

"Sometimes, we just get these really weird urges and feel like making you guys do something nonsensical while describing it as teamwork building activities." Kakashi answered blatantly and truthfully.

"Ooohhhh…" said all the students with a nod.


End file.
